Wednesday, June 14, 2017

Going Fishing

There's a saying.. Fish or cut bait.

I've been wrestling with these dark diamonds for a couple of weeks.

I got some more large prints that didn't seem quite so dark. Here I've put fussy cut large prints in the medium sized diamonds, but I wasn't sure about them. Every time I placed the small diamonds nearby I was unsure about the dark fabric on either side of the small colored ones. I tried different fabrics, dark green, silvery gray or teal. I was spending a lot of time "cutting bait," screwing around cutting fabrics and not really getting anywhere.

But every time I'd be scrolling through my photostream and I'd pass these pictures, whoever was sitting next to me would see these and say, "OH, I like that."

Well after I heard that four or five times, I stopped and thought about it. Maybe my problem with the idea of this quilt I'm being too hard on myself.

So I pulled out most of the medium sized diamonds in big prints, and decided to go back to the blenders I had been using. I'll never forget something Mary Ellen Hopkins told me when I met her at Quilt Market in 1984. "You have to have darks in your lights, and lights in your darks."

I started making the little four patch diamonds using a couple of different dark backgrounds. It's looking better, and I'm feeling good about it, even if it looks worse in photos than it does in real life.

I like your solution better even though I didn't see anything wrong with the original photos. That's the difference between working on it personally and simply viewing it. I'm glad you're creating a series of diamonds.

I rather like you first picture it makes me think of light dappling thru dense forest. I thing you just need to adjust the balance of your lighter colours. Going fishing to change focus is a good thing.

Who I Am

My name is Lynne Tyler and I live in New England in the USA. I've been sewing since 5th grade and making quilts since college. I love working with abstract shapes and color. I love strip piecing. I'm trained as an artist, and I love the graphic quality of quilts. I'd rather take the time to make something beautiful than buy something ugly. My companion is my tuxedo cat, Millie, who has her own blog at darlingmillie.blogspot.com.